GUARDIAN I

ALTERNATE VERSIONS

In the reality presented in What If (2nd series) #59, Alpha Flight’s second battle with the X-Men had a very different outcome. As Guardian and his team left the battle with Logan, the X-Men pursued into Canadian airspace and were shot down by Canadian forces, killing the team. Hudson had sent orders to the contrary which were erased by Northstar.  Despite Logan’s anger regarding the death of his new friends in the X-Men, Mac convinced him to stay on and lead Alpha Flight. Mac resigned as Guardian but continued to mentor the team. Leadership suited Logan and Alpha soon became a major heroic team on par with the Avengers. When Logan inevitably learned the truth, he chose to forgive Mac and remain with Alpha Flight feeling it was the best way to honor his slain X-Men teammates.

In the Mutant X universe, Canada was the most militarily-aggressive country on the planet, having conquered Russia, China, and most of Southeast Asia. Canadian and US relations were at an all-time low, and border disputes threatened to turn a cold war between the neighboring country hot at any moment. James MacDonald Hudson, as Guardian, led an elite team of government operatives known as Alpha Flight to watch for border violations and protect Canada from invaders. Hudson was directly involved with the Weapon X Program in this reality, turning Logan into Wolverine. Although the two men were like brothers at one point, Hudson didn't hesitate to force Logan through the experiment for the good of his country. After Logan, Creed and Wildchild escaped into the wilderness, Guardian and Alpha Flight hunted them down and finally recaptured the rogue operatives. Unfortunately for Hudson, Logan escaped again and tore through his former friend to do it. Mac had to be heavily rebuilt as a cyborg in order to survive his injuries. During a conflict between the Canadian super-soldiers, the Avengers, and Havok's team, The Six, Hudson was killed when the new Captain America went insane and unleashed his unstoppable power against the Canadians, vaporizing them.

The James MacDonald Hudson of Earth-3470 led a slightly different life than his mainstream Marvel Universe counterpart. He was still a key part of Alpha Flight but in this reality, Logan remained as the team’s leader and Sasquatch was a scientist named Heather McDaniel. This Heather married Logan but after his death, she found comfort and love with Mac. The pair eventually married and Mac became Guardian. But he lost Heather when she became “unhinged from time” and was recruited to join the reality-hopping Exiles.

Heather Mac were eventually reunited when the Exiles landed in their reality.  Mac offered the Exiles a place on his Alpha Flight team but they refused, determined to find a way to return to their home realities. Heather and Mac live happily together, though she continues to aid the Exiles.

In the Days of Future Present, Past Participle storyline, the All-New, All-Different Alpha Flight attempted to alter the timestream to save the lives of Flashback and James MacDonald Hudson. Unfortunately, each action they took produced a new, bleaker alternate future. In the first alternate reality, the team warned Mac about the attack by Jerry Jaxon that led to his death. Mac defeated Jaxon and lived, but Jaxon then created an army of Box robots that destroyed Canada. In the second reality, Guardian and Alpha Flight relocated to America after their showy public victory over Omega Flight in New York. Redubbed "Alpha North America", they fought off countless menaces to their southern neighbor, even saving Earth's Mightiest Heroes from death at the hands of Onslaught.

Tragically, however, their success in America meant that Guardian and Alpha were MIA when the horde of Plodex eggs hatched in Canada, forcing the nations of the world to nuke the Great White North into oblivion.  In the third iteration, Guardian and Alpha Flight merged with Omega Flight as one large group, which eventually led to a Superhuman Civil War in Canada. Things grew so out of control that the Canadian Militia for a Super-Hero-Free Country was established, leading to Guardian and the rest of Alpha Flight being rounded up or killed. In the last alternate future created by the present Alpha Flight's haphazard time travel, Guardian had become a cold and unfeeling dictator following the death of his wife Heather during the fight with Omega Flight. He managed to conquer the entire world as an outlet for his grief, and nearly killed the new Alpha Flight after learning of their involvement in Heather's death. One last round of time travel and a dose of Shaman's magic reversed the majority of Alpha Flight's temporal blunders.

In Earth X, Guardian was rebuilt as a synthezoid, almost completely robotic in nature. Alpha Flight stood guard over one of the Human Torches which were burning the Terrigen Mists out of Earth's atmosphere but suffered severe losses when a horde of Wendigo attacked the tower. The only survivors were Sasquatch and Mac Hudson, who was reduced to little more than a talking head and severed robotic spinal column. On the run from the Wendigo in the Canadian woods, Sasquatch and Hudson were found by Wolverine's kin, the last tribe of pure humans left on the Earth, untouched by the Celestial seed. Finding an isolated workshop hidden in an unassuming cave, Sasquatch spent the better part of a year finding a way to restore Hudson to a real body. Eventually, one of the pure humans offered himself up as a host for Guardian's robotic consciousness. Guardian's severed head attached itself over the primitive's skull and took control, animating the body as his own.

The Mac Hudson of the Ultimate Universe of Mac Hudson led a very different life. He served in the Canadian military in Iraq alongside James “Logan” Howlett. Logan saved Mac’s life on more than one occasion and the two became close friends. During this period, Mac may also have served as Vindicator alongside Wolverine. It was Logan that introduced Mac to his future wife Heather.

After the war, Mac and Heather resettled in Florida where Mac became the local sheriff and Heather the host of a radio talk show. They hadn’t seen Logan in a while when he showed up at their door with a crying baby. He gave the child to the Hudsons saying that he wasn’t fit to raise a child. They joyfully accepted the baby, having been unable to have one of their own. They raised young Jimmy Hudson as their own, though he was clearly “his father’s son” in many ways. It wasn’t until after the world-changing events unleashed by Magneto that Jimmy’s mutant powers manifested. Following Wolverine’s death, Kitty Pryde came to the Hudson home and revealed the truth of Jimmy’s parentage.